Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Bum rush the show: Spike Lee finally gets his Oscar

Spike Lee accepts his Honorary Oscar from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

By my estimation, Spike Lee should have three Oscars, maybe
four. In reality, he has been nominated only twice and won neither time. It is
a game people who follow the Academy Awards play to determine filmmakers most
overdue for recognition. Martin Scorsese was at the top of the list for a long
time until he won Best Director in 2006 for The
Departed. Now, you will hear names such as David Fincher, David O. Russell,
and Christopher Nolan, but rarely will you hear Lee. Well, it may not be
competitive, but Lee has got his Oscar, and at least from this writer’s
perspective, it has been a long time coming.

On Saturday night, Lee, Gena Rowlands, and Debbie Reynolds
were recognized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences at the
annual Governors Awards, the Academy’s lifetime achievement honors. Reynolds
received the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award for her tireless charity work
throughout the years, while Rowlands and Lee each received an honorary Oscar
statuette for their contributions to the medium.

Each is highly deserving of the honor, but I want to focus
on Lee here. Rowlands and Reynolds are accomplished performers in their 80s. It
seems about time for them to be snatching up career achievement awards. Lee is
not yet 60. He is still churning out films – some great, some less so, but all bearing
the mark of an auteur. So, it may seem curious to bestow a career honor on
someone in the middle of his career.

In January, the 2014 Academy Awards nominations famously spawned
the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag for the failure to nominate a single black
performer, writer, or director and the general whiteness of the nominees on the
whole. Since then, under the guidance of President Cheryl Boone Isaacs, the
Academy has taken steps to address its own lack of diversity, as well as the
lack of diversity in the industry overall. At Saturday’s ceremony, Isaacs
introduced the A2020 program, aimed at improving diversity of race, gender,
age, class, etc., in Hollywood.

Never one to mince words or miss an opportunity to stir the
pot, Lee had some strong words for the Hollywood establishment to close his
acceptance speech. While the majority of Lee’s lengthy 18-minute address told
the story of his discovery of filmmaking, the final two minutes were directed
pointedly at a room of mostly white, mostly wealthy Academy members and
supporters. Lee did not pull his punches, and for those of us similarly
concerned with issues of diversity and representation, he did not disappoint.

“I want to commend the president, Cheryl Boone Isaacs,
because she is trying to do something that needs to be done,” said Lee. “I don’t
know if you noticed, but the United States Census Bureau says that by the year
2043, white Americans are going to be a minority in this country. And, for all
the people out there who are in a position of hiring, you better get smart
because your workforce should reflect what this country looks like.

“I’m going to get real here. Everybody in here probably
voted for Obama, but when I go to offices, I don’t see no black folks. Instead,
brother-man is a security guard who checks my name off the list as I go into
the studio. So, we can talk – ‘Yabba, yabba, yabba’ – but we need to have some
serious discussions about diversity and get some flavor up in this. This
industry is so behind sports it’s ridiculous. It’s easier to be the president
of the United States as a black person than to be the head of the studio … or
head of a network.”

The message was strong, smart, and necessary for an industry
that risks falling behind the rest of the world. The people we see on screen
should reflect the people we see in our lives. Hollywood has an opportunity and
an obligation to be inclusive, but if it shirks that responsibility, it will be
Hollywood that ultimately is left out in the cold.